mittee was afterwards known by the name of the CHAP. committee of accommodation.

The presbyterians, including the Scots, inclined to the first part of the alternative here stated; and, seeing that their adversaries were too formidable, both in energy and ability, to be subdued by means of rigour alone, consented to call on them for a statement of what they required", and were willing to consider whether, by some unessential sacrifices, they could win them over to the union they so earnestly desired. But the independents did not approve of this mode of settling the business, and, to the great astonishment and scandal of their opponents, not contented with being tolerated themselves, insisted upon the same privilege for anabaptists, Lutherans, and the adherents of every kind of error, provided it were not fundamental, or maintained against knowledge c.

XXIII.

1645.

church

Another question, intimately connected with Terms of this, and not less earnestly debated, was that of communion ecclesiastical discipline, or the power of the keys. debated. This contained in it admission to or exclusion from the symbols of the Christian faith, excommunication, and church-censures, together with such incapacities and badges of disgrace as it might be judged proper to annex to these cen

b Baillie, Vol. II, p. 97, 134, 139, 149.

Ibid. p. 169, 170, 172.

CHAP. sures.

XXIII.

1645.

Appeal to

the two houses of parliament proposed.

Power of the independents increases.

Strength of

The power of suppressing heretical doctrines was not complete without that addition. The Scots therefore, and the adherents of their system in England, required that this power should be vested exclusively, and in its full extent, in the officers and councils of the church. There was no question that the presbyterian hierarchy and gradation of classes and officers were to be set up in England by law. The power of discipline was therefore to be ceded to the hierarchy; but it was disputed, with what limitations it was to be given, in the first instance; and next the friends of liberty insisted that an appeal should lie from the censures of the church to the judgment of parliament. Of course all the common topics lay open in this case, against the sacrilege of referring what was done by spiritual persons in the exercise of their functions, to the examination and control of a lay assembly.

The power of the independents however was perpetually increasing. It was the army of the new model that won the battle of Naseby, and, after that victory, had with so much vigilance and success completed the campaigu: and their exploits stood in strong contrast with the fluctuating and irresolute proceedings of the presbyterian commanders in former years, and with the inactiveness and inefficiency of the Scots' army in the present year.

The parties in this great contention for religious

XXIII.

1645.

the two

and intellectual liberty were very closely matched; CHAP. and seldom has any struggle been carried on with more vigorous pertinacity. On the one side were the city of London, the London clergy, and parties. doubtless the majority of the clergy throughout the kingdom, the assembly of divines, and the potent and combined body of the Scottish nation. On the other side were the army, the religious independents, the political independents, the Erastians, such as Selden and Whitlocke, and a' combination of men of the highest degree of talent, Cromwel, Vane, St. John, and others. The parliament itself was nearly equally divided; and sometimes the one party had the prevalent authority, and sometimes the other.

The most earnest contention was directed to the point of excommunication, in which the church demanded to be vested with a full and unlimited authority. The adversaries of presbyterian usurpation directed their efforts to the controling and shackling that authority. They first caused the house of commons to call on the assembly for a specific enumeration of those disqualifications which should be sufficient to shut out the individual from a participation in religious ordinances, that this enumeration might be inserted in a law to be made on the subject. The assembly consented to give in an enumeration, but urged the

Topics of

their con

tention.

XXIII.

CHAP. necessity of its being followed with a general clause, providing for other scandals and irregularities not contained in the schedule. Another point in which they were thwarted about the same time, was in a vote of the house of commons, by which it was provided that, if any person should find himself aggrieved by the proceedings of those possessing authority in any particular congregation, he should have the liberty of appeal to the classical assembly, from thence to the provincial, from thence to the national, and finally to the parliament: thus giving to the civil authority the superiority in the last resort over the ecclesiastical. Thus far the business had advanced previously to the great event of the battle of Naseby.

Discussion respecting

sent

On the seventh of July the assembly of divines lay-elders. up to the two houses of parliament what they considered as a complete system of churchgovernment. The presbyterians and the Scots wished this system to be passed by the legislature without alteration; but such was by no means the Ordinance purpose of the opposite party. The chief modiappointing fication introduced into it appears to have been, that a committee of ministers and others should be appointed by authority of parliament, to take into consideration the exceptions that might be tendered against the lay officers, denominated

Triers.

CHAP.

XXIII.

the assem

elders, who might be chosen by the ministers and members of the several congregations, and either to approve of them, or set them aside, as to their judgment should appear fittings. The majority Petition of of the assembly on the other hand felt the greatest bly. repugnance to the interference of the civil power in this, and still more in the question of disqualifications to participate in religious ordinances, and petitioned the two houses accordingly. They went so far in their petition as to say, that if the ministers and elders were not sufficiently authorised to keep away all wicked and scandalous persons from the sacrament, they foresaw, that not only they, but many of their godly brethren, must be put to the hard choice, either to forsake their stations in the church, or to partake in the sins which must result; and they added, that in that alternative they were resolved with God's grace to chuse affliction rather than iniquity. These representations do not appear to have met with much attention; and the ordinance respecting the election of elders passed into a law on the nineteenth of August. The more immediate object of this ordinance was the establishment of a presbyterian church-government within the province of London, with suitable provisions for the

• Journals of Lords, Aug. 19.

h Journals of Commons, Aug. 1, 8.

i Journals of Lords, Aug. 12.